News tagged with 'Infants'

The birth of octuplets this week was initially heralded by the media and medical community, but now the tough questions are being asked with few answers.  Who funded this fertility treatment and how will the woman and her family be able to afford the children after it was revealed she already has six at home.   Medical ethicists says professional guidelines would not have allowed this to happen.

A new study by U.S. researchers suggests babies conceived using in vitro fertilization are two to four times more likely to be born with certain birth defects compared to babies that are conceived naturally.

The U.S. has not improved its infant mortality ranking since 2000, partially due to an increase in premature births.  As it stands now, about 28,000 infants die in the U.S. before their first birthday every year making it 29th in the world in infant mortality, lagging behind other developed nations.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is raising the guidelines on vitamin D for infants, children and adolescents as rickets appears to be on the rise in the U.S. once again.  The recommendation is to have at least 400 IU a day for children beginning in infancy. For adults 1,000 IU daily may not be enough.

Two arrests have been made and 19 people are detained in China after it's alleged that they added the chemical melamine to milk at a processing facility. Toxic baby formula has now killed 2 infants and hundreds are sickened. The FDA warns parents in the U.S. not to feed formula from China to infants.

SIDS is still classified as a natural cause of death and is considered rare. Even when parents follow the recommendation to remove obstacles in a crib and put babies to sleep on their backs, it still occurs. The actual number of SIDS deaths may be underreported as it is often mislabeled as another cause of death. 

A new study by Canadian researchers suggests affluent women that live near highways are more likely to deliver a pre-term, low-birth-weight or small baby. The study found disproportionately high associations between mothers living close to a highway and birth complications among affluent mothers.

The Kids Count annual report finds the number of low birth weight infants is rising due to prematurity and poverty. The southern U.S. is particularly hard hit.

Sweden is the best place for mothers and by implication the survival of their infants according to a Save the Children annual report. Ethiopia is among the worst places where 84 percent of children never receive the basics in medical care.

The Consumer Product Safety Commission says look out for nursery equipment.  Cribs, high chairs, child walkers were involve in more than 66,000 injuries in 2006, a marked increase from the year before.